Friends Reunited

It has been a week of happy reunions and visiting more of beautiful Poland

the Demordaunt family

Stunning Zakopane

Lake 'Morskie Oko'

Sister Barney

the Kamp family

Warsaw Zone Training - Speak only in Polish and study only in Polish!

So on Saturday we had the chance to go to leave Poznań for the day and go to Warsaw for zone training. We're not part of that zone but there was some confusion with the travel and plans so instead of going to Gdańsk for training we went to the Capital. We left early that morning at around 8, I had McDonald's breakfast which is a must before train rides. We got to Warsaw and it was cold and it had rained..there was also a NATO summit going on so the streets were closed and there were Police everywhere and every few minutes a police escort would drive past. It was the first time in the Warsaw chapel.  

We actually have a church building, not just a rented out office space. It's pretty nice too. It was good to see missionaries I've not seen for a while, even some from the mission I've never met before. President and Sister Turek were running late so we had lunch and chatted before the meeting. I got to see my bro and trainer Elder Taylor one last time, which we thought would never happen. Sisters Kamp, Dekker and Barney were there too so it was good to see them. 

Elder Taylor - bro and trainer

The training meeting started, we had some reading and preparation to do on faith for the meeting - and so faith is exactly what we spoke about. The whats, the whos and the whys of faith. It was short but we were taught a lot and it sparked a lot of thoughts in my mind. President and Sister Turek are great people and it's going to be good working with them. We took some things home with us, one of those things being,  speak only in Polish and study only in Polish, this is going to help us all progress a lot.

Warsaw Zone Training - President and Sister Turek front right

We left training with the Lublin Elders and we did it in perfect missionary style by setting off late and then having to get across Warsaw to the station in world record time. We got the first tram and then had to get off and sprint to the metro and catch an underground train and then get off that with a final 300m sprint to the station. It was tense, tiring, funny, and probably a funny sight for the public to see,  7 smartly dressed missionaries carrying boxes and bags running across Warsaw!  So in the end the Lublin Elders missed their train by literally 1 minute, and we made ours with 3 minutes to spare. 

Church was good yesterday.  We had 3 members show up and also we had someone we invited there too which was a miracle from the week. Karol and Sergiusz both spoke on the topic of leadership in the church and then I finished the meeting by talking about how we can remember the Saviour using the talk from Elder Gong from the  last conference. 

Other things that have gone on this week. We had a really nice lunch on Tuesday after district meeting at this Indian place, it was really nice.  I had something similar to tikka massala maybe. I got bit again, twice on my shin and then one down by where my ankle meets my foot, and they've swelled up a lot, quite annoying and they're itchy as flip but I'll get over it.

We played football on an actual 3g pitch with goals on Friday, kicking a ball about is the best way for me to relieve stress I feel. 

We've decided to focus on the members and less active work as our biggest effort, we've not been having much success with finding and contacting so we feel member and less active work is what we should do. We're still going to find and contact but we're trying to find new ways in which we can make those finding activities successful.

Warsaw Chapel

All I've got time for, have a boss week!

Pozdrawiam,

-Starszy Ashworth

'I'm a Missionary!'

Squad pic after English class

Dzień dobry was! We've had a pretty solid week in Poznań..więc zacznijmy od Wtorku.

Wtorek - As you know Pday was on Tuesday last week. The Escape room we did with Sławek was tough but we managed to get out within the hour. It was different to the last one we did, in that we didn't start blindfolded and chained to a wall haha. This one was more about solving puzzles and working things out as opposed to just trying to open locks and things. We had FHE that night which went really well. We had 4 members there which is better than usual. We had a short spiritual thought and taught them about all the prophets from this dispensation, from Joseph Smith all the way through to Thomas S Monson. It was fun because it's not common knowledge here in Poland. The members had never even heard of Gordon B Hinckley. Then we played bean bag toss. we played 4 vs 4, and had these targets made out of a board of wood with a whole in it. I was on form, I think I hit 8 in a row at one point. After that we taught Joanna the plan of salvation. Probably the most in-depth plan of salvation lesson Elder Jeffs and I will ever teach. 

Środa - We had another good District meeting. This time we went through the most important part of any contact, which is bearing testimony and inviting the spirit. We practiced a few times and spoke about key points which need to be included when in 'step 3'. After we put it to work on the street and had a couple hours contacting. The weather was really nice, I had the classical missionary look with just a white shirt and tie...No coat was needed!! We managed to get a few numbers but not set up with them yet. We contact on a corner known as 'Fredra', a busy tram stop, it's close to town and the uni is close so it's a quality contacting area. We taught the Advanced English class this time.  It seems to work well with the advanced class. Afterwards we invited everyone back in to the chapel and the four of us sang a song that Elder Jeffs and I wrote to Sławek as it was his last English class. It was so funny. We ended the night with some classic English contacting. 

Czwartek -  The day with Elder Garrison. His comp had to go into Warsaw for legal work and so joined us in Poznań for the day and night. They're serving in Szczecin which is miles away from Warsaw. We contacted in the morning before having lunch at Bożena's. We then picked Elder Garrison up from the station and went out for more food before going out contacting again. The weather was even better than the previous day. Also I contacted on my own for the very first time, I seemed to understand a little better than I usually would do, maybe I was blessed for acting. I was myself and had fun with it and it worked out alright. Also we managed to hook ourselves up with a list of 3 good service opportunities around Poznań. Elder Vance managed to get in contact with the council and this guy sorted us out big time. The night ended with us English contacting, the highlight being an awkward 5 minutes with drunk people.  

Piątek -  We spent the morning inside with studies and weekly planning before taking Elder Garrison to the train station. We went to a pretty nice Milk bar for lunch, can't complain with a 14Zł lunch. Not much happened through the day, we had someone not show up for a meeting which always ruins plans, so we decided to go and tract in the area a member lives as he had invited us over and he lives way out. No look with the tracting but you speak to an array of people which is always fun. The lesson with Maciej (member) was good, we taught him about teaching in the church and shared our experiences with teaching. 

Sobota - We met with a referral early morning but it turned out he only wanted a book and then he left, so we were like...huh...what shall we do, we did nothing exciting we just went over our plans for the day haha. We had KraszKebab for lunch, this place has changed my opinion on kebabs, and the missionaries are friends with the workers there. We had 4 new English students come to English class, we taught beginner class and sang a song with them which is always a good time. Nobody stayed for religious class so we took dinner at the chapel before heading out to tract Świerczewo for the evening. Again we split and Elder Liechty came with me. 

Niedziela - The day of District Conference in Bydgoszcs..us missionaries got a ride there with Marcus. Which led to the first miracle of the day. We had 9 members from Poznań get there on the bus. We were well represented at conference, even President Edgren commented on it. The day went really well, we had Elder Limer (Area 70) there at the conference. We had a priesthood session in the morning before having the general session at 12. There was around 60-70 people and it was nice to see that Poland has a solid base of members here. Sister Kamp and Dekker were there too which was nice. Marcus got us invited to the Tufts (senior couple) after conference for a fun evening of games and food. There were 10 of us there including a family from Gdańsk and an investigator from Bydgoszcs. As we were sat around the table playing 'Wackey 6' I had a moment where I realised 'flip I’m a Missionary'. I remembered the times we would have the elders round for tea, their white shirts and Spirit they would bring, then I looked down and saw I had a white shirt and name tag on, I felt calm and smiled and continued on with the game but it was a nice moment. The journey home was crazy as we left a bit late and had a two-hour drive. Marcus and his driving, it's something else, but with him being Austrian I put total trust in him. We made it home on time though haha!